


They used to shout my name, now they whisper it

by CheapLemonIceLolly



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Blood, M/M, Monsters, mild body horror, monsterism is a metaphor, the healing power of love and friendship, the real villain is loading very young people with huge expectations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-29
Updated: 2017-11-29
Packaged: 2019-02-08 09:09:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12861351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CheapLemonIceLolly/pseuds/CheapLemonIceLolly
Summary: Being a star athlete changes you.





	They used to shout my name, now they whisper it

**Author's Note:**

> This isn’t much like my usual stuff, but I’ve had it in my WIP folder since the playoffs last season, so I thought I’d dust it off and finish it. The violence warning is just being on the safe side; the violence in this isn’t extreme but there’s multiple blood mentions, so I thought better safe than sorry.
> 
> I just have a lot of feelings about young superstars, you guys.
> 
> Title from Yellow Flicker Beat by Lorde

Patrick Marleau arrives in Toronto with a soft voice, a gentle smile, and a wife and four kids in tow. He’s also been in San Jose so long he has three rows of jagged shark teeth, so sharp they cut into his lip if he smiles too hard. They’ve all seen him in highlight reels, mid-celly with blood pouring down his chin. Somehow the soft spoken, fatherly guy in the locker room isn’t really what Auston expected after that.

Halfway through training camp the teeth start to fall out. They make a clattering noise on the ice like breaking a string of beads. Mo just shrugs and cuts a glance at Auston.

“It’s him,” he says. “Nothing to do with you, just. Matty soaks up all the magic around here.”

Auston frowns at him and crouches down to help Patty pick his teeth up off the ice, ten wickedly sharp little arrowheads that he cups in the palm of his glove.

“I don’t think it’s me,” Auston says apologetically. Toronto’s just weird about magic. Patty smiles at him, the soft little smile that doesn’t show his teeth. He’s got a nice face without the teeth. Comforting.

“I don’t mind,” he says. “They kind of scared the kids, anyway.”

*

Being a star athlete changes you.

That’s not a metaphor or anything, either. It’s a fact, observable, documented, subject of countless studies. The interaction between innate talent on the part of the athlete and worship on the part of fans is not fully understood but results in physical changes over time, manifesting as blah blah blah. It means major league athletes are weird. Weird in ways that range from the barely noticeable to the...well. Dramatic.

It’s what marks you out as one to watch in elite sports, being a little more (or maybe a little less) than human. Something in the heady mix of competition, talent, and the worshipful adoration of thousands of fans all focusing on the same point turns people into stars, and takes some of them past the point of being just people.

Auston doesn’t have any shark teeth. Or...whatever the Canadian equivalent of shark teeth would be. Moose antlers? A beaver tail? That’s not how they do things in Toronto, or at least that’s what he was told when he first signed here. There is no face of the franchise. The logo is the face of the franchise.

It seems to be true, mostly. Toronto’s got plenty of magic, more than other places maybe; you can’t get within two miles of the ACC without feeling it, fizzing on your tongue like baking soda. The players just don’t tend to tap into it in the same way they do in, say, Pittsburgh, where every second guy on the roster seems to have horns or fangs. He doesn’t know if that’s because they’re not supposed to, like they’re not supposed to grow their hair long or have beards, or whether they just don’t know how because no one on the team talks about it. He certainly doesn’t know how. He’s not going to ask.

Auston knows why Mo thinks one person could “soak up all the magic,” though. Look at Edmonton. There’s a city that’s got more than its fair share of magic (like, obviously, look what they’ve got lurking at the top of Rogers Place, overseeing everything like a God). But you can see it in every Oilers home game, all the magic so intensely focused in one spot there’s none left for anyone else. McDavid burns with a bright flame, a golden boy who increasingly looks as if he’s been literally dipped in gold, so brilliant sometimes it’s like looking into the sun. But the rest of them are just hockey players. Ordinary. Even the good ones.

Every so often the cameras turn up to the private box at the top of the arena to show the shadowy outline of the Great One, always watching. Nobody’s seen him up close in years, but even the dark shape of him makes Auston’s skin crawl; the long horns that curve brutally sharp from his huge head. Goat, they call him sometimes. Auston doesn’t even know any more whether they mean greatest of all time, or something scarier than that.

He hates playing in Edmonton.

How much faster does the magic work on McDavid, being its sole focus all the time? How far gone is he now, his third year in? Auston wonders if his blood has started to change, yet, if he really bleeds blue and orange like his terrifying predecessor used to. Probably still would, if anyone dared to get close enough to make him bleed these days. He wonders what that feels like, if it’s different to just having normal blood. It’s got to be, surely?

He and Crosby are going to have to battle it out for next boogeyman of the NHL on their own, anyway. Even if Auston wanted in on that action, he’s in Toronto. That’s not how they do things in Toronto.

*

Kells grins at him across the table with too-sharp teeth like a dog’s, orders his steak so rare it looks purple in the middle when he slices into it.

“I don’t know why you’re holding out, man,” he says. “It’s awesome. Even on this piece of shit team the rush is unbelievable, I can’t even imagine what kind of power you’re sitting on up here.”

Auston feels a flash of annoyance hearing Arizona called a piece of shit, even though he knows Kells doesn’t really mean it. That’s just him, how he talks about everything. He shrugs.

“I’m not really,” he says. “That’s just not how we do things here.”

Kells rolls his eyes and Fisch laughs, kicking him under the table.

“Such a good boy, Matts,” he says. “You’re turning Canadian on us.”

He’s sort of got a point, though. Auston really is sitting on a powderkeg of magic in Toronto, magic that hasn’t really transformed anyone in decades. Auston felt it building all last year, felt the way it homed in on him like steel filings zooming towards a strong magnet as the fans fixated on him, as his stats climbed and his jersey sales went through the roof. It crackles under his skin like electricity every time he steps out on ACC ice and burns in the back of his throat at the end of every shift. That may not be the way they do things in Toronto, but the fans don’t seem to care about that, and when it comes to magic it’s the fans that matter the most.

He doesn't know too much about what to do with that. You don't really learn those legends on dinky half rinks in the middle of the desert, although he’s heard a few things since, in the USNTDP and in Switzerland. He saw a few more things at the World Cup, skating with McDavid. You see a lot when your captain’s so firmly on the fast track to terrifying monster town that they make up a whole new team just to give him a C. Well that’s the rumour; there’s also the possibility it wouldn’t be safe to have him and Crosby on the same team. Who knows what they could do together, or what they might do to each other, if anyone let them get that close for that long.

Auston’s loyal to the system, he _is_ , but privately he wonders if the Leafs might have been more successful if they encouraged a little more monsterism. It's not like they've never had anyone great, but in recent years guys always seem to do better after they leave. Kessel’s wings grew in as soon as he got to Pittsburgh, black and gold, and it was so immediate it was like they’d always been there, just waiting for the opportunity. They look pretty sick now, but they would have been beautiful in white and blue.

Maybe Toronto’s magic just doesn’t like Americans. Depressing thought.

Still, Auston’s thinking about what Kells said when they take the ice the next night, his hometown team in his new home. The buzzing energy of the ACC seems stronger, somehow, like it’s vibrating inside his chest instead of all around him, humming through his veins and making his fingertips tingle in his gloves. He doesn’t know what’s different about tonight, whether maybe he’s just more aware of it than usual or what, but the feeling is exhilarating.

It’s so exhilarating he barely even feels the blade of Domi's stick collide with his face, just hears the whistle sound as his head jerks backwards, hard enough to knock his helmet askew. Mo skates over to check on him as Auston doubles over, presses his lips together and feels the jagged little pain of a cut lip spilling blood into his mouth. It stings, but it's probably not a big deal. He should go back to the bench and get cleaned up, but he's not hurt, not really.

But Mo shies away when he straightens up, hands held up in front of him as if he wants to ward Auston off, or placate him maybe. Willy and Zach are staring at him, open mouthed. _Everyone_ on the ice is staring, frozen, the ref still with his whistle hanging out of his mouth.

“What?” Auston laughs. “I’m fine, it’s only a bit of blood.”

He tugs his glove off and wipes his fingers across his smarting mouth, sweaty and incredibly unhygienic, probably, but he can taste the blood on his lips, sharp and metallic. 

His hand comes away blue.

“Oh,” he says. 

The roaring in his ears is crowd and blood and something much, much bigger underneath; he can smell the oily hot smoke of magic swirling around him, now. Mo’s lips peel back in an expression that’s a little bit awed and a lot terrified. It makes Auston think of something he learned in school, about how the word “awful” used to mean “super impressive” and only came to mean “the fucking worst” later on.

“Hey,” he says, weirdly calm, “Hey, it’s okay.” It feels as if he’s running on autopilot, like the magic riding him is making all the decisions when he reaches out and touches Mo’s face with his blood smeared hand. Like, that should be gross, but it feels like the right thing to do somehow. Mo shudders and closes his eyes, almost leaning into the touch, and Auston doesn’t know why but he thinks: _mine_ , like the word’s just been dropped directly into his head.

He looks around at his other teammates, at Mitch and the others leaning half over the boards to stare at him, and thinks the same thing, the magic flaring fierce and possessive through his whole body. _They’re all mine_. He lifts his gaze above the ice, looks around the stands, and the ACC _explodes._

He can feel blood running down his chin, burning with magic and no doubt as blue as the livid streak he’s left on Mo’s cheek.

The crowd are screaming, it’s impossible to say whether they’re scared out of their minds or wild with joy, and even over the deafening thunder of the arena losing its collective mind, the thing being born inside him is louder.

_Mine._

_Mine._

_Mine._

*

It’s all over the internet within minutes, of course, that moment in the broadcast where the camera operator had the defining moment of of his career and zoomed right in on Auston’s face with bright blue blood all over it. There are screenshots and gifs and memes of it everywhere, which Mitch insists on sending him whenever he sees a new one. There’s a whole video of just that one zooming shot, over and over again, with “cold as ice” playing over the top, that Mitch thinks is hysterical. It makes Auston feel nauseous, but it’s kind of funny too. Mitch retweets it and it goes viral so fast it ends up on Sportsnet.

Auston barely recognises himself in any of them, honestly, the expression on his face is just. Unearthly. And it’s like his instinctual monkey brain sees the blue blood and starts screaming _No, Wrong, Danger_. It’s kind of terrifying, but a hell of a rush at the same time. That’s some fucking magic right there.

McDavid is furious about it. He calls Auston the morning after.

“Look,” he says, voice all steely, with these weird harmonic overtones like someone striking a metal bar on a stone. “ _Look_. I like you, and Marns likes you, so I don’t want to hurt you, but I’m only going to say this once. There’s only one Great One for a reason. This isn’t a race everyone can win.”

He's probably right about that. Certainly he knows more about how magic works than Auston does, like a good little Canadian boy. Auston just doesn’t see why he thinks the winning spot is reserved for him.

“He used to be a sweet kid,” Mitch tells him later, as if they're not all still kids. “Honestly. But they get territorial. And he changed a lot last season, with the Hart and everything.”

 _They_ get territorial. Auston doesn’t know if he means monsters in general or just the worst monsters, the ones who change slowly from the inside out, who bleed colours and shape hearts and minds as much as they’re shaped by them. Generational talents.

“Sorry,” Mitch says, “I didn’t mean...you’re a you, not a them.”

He doesn’t know about that. He doesn’t feel quite like himself any more. It’s not like he made a decision to change, or he doesn’t think so. It just happened, as swift and unstoppable as a car crash on a frozen road, his shockingly blue blood dripping onto the ice. He could be a them.

McDavid wouldn't be warning him off if he didn't already think Auston was a threat.

*

“Do you really want to look like one of them?” says Mitch one afternoon when they’re hanging out before a game. “I mean, you’re pretty good looking, now.”

“Thanks Marns,” Auston says dryly, to cover up the way his insides sort of flip flop in response.

“And sure the, like, creepy penguin thing works for Crosby. That whole black and white deal.” He leans back on the couch and frowns up at the ceiling, thoughtful. “But what if you turned into a giant tree person or something. That’d be weird.”

“A tree person?”

“You know, like a maple tree. Oh hey, maybe you’ll bleed maple syrup. That’d be cool.”

Auston snorts. “That or I’ll turn into a big cuddly polar bear,” he says, thinking of their dorky mascot. He kind of hopes Crosby’s final form isn’t really going to be a giant penguin, poor guy.

Mitch leans in against his side, wraps his arms around Auston’s middle and clings like an octopus (Auston tries not to think about Henrik Zetterberg and his tentacle beard). “That’d be alright,” he muses, and gives Auston an experimental squeeze, like he’s imagining what hugging a polar bear would be like. Then he shudders. “As long as the teeth weren’t too freaky.” 

They played the Bruins last week. Nothing sticks in your mind quite like the sight of eleven feet of Chara bearing down on you with huge yellow fangs bared.

“You know _you_ wouldn’t have to worry about my freaky polar bear teeth,” Auston tells him, looping an arm around his shoulders. “None of you would. You’re mine.”

It just kind of slips out. He feels this fierce rush of almost blinding rage whenever he thinks about someone hurting them, any of the Leafs, and he guesses this is that territorial thing at work. But probably people don’t like it that much when you call them _yours_ unprompted. _There’s no face of the franchise,_ he tells himself, like a mantra. _The logo is the face of the franchise._

“Hmm,” Mitch says skeptically against his shoulder. But he sounds pleased too.

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Auston says, turning his hand over to watch the shimmer of magic chasing across his skin like glittering ice crystals. That’s new, just in the last couple weeks, but it’s kind of cool. Hypnotic. “Whatever it’s going to look like, it’s happening. I couldn’t stop it if I wanted to.”

And I don't think I want to, he doesn't say.

Mitch’s eyes are doing that glazed over thing again as he watches Auston's hand sparkle. That happens with almost everyone sometimes, more and more often as the magic gets stronger, but with Mitch it’s more often and more easily than anyone else. When he’s like this he’d do anything Auston asked. Probably eventually he won’t even have to ask. He’s seen Crosby direct plays on the ice as if his linemates are just extensions of his own body, every Penguin exactly where he wants them to be without being told. A team with only lesser monsters could practice that for years and never come close to the cohesion they have. The thought thrills Auston a little bit. It’s like the heavy, risky feeling of holding a loaded gun in your bare hands; the sense of having more power than a person is supposed to have.

Not that he’s exactly a person. Not anymore.

He strokes Mitch’s hair with one magic-glittering hand.

“Why don’t you go to sleep?” he suggests, low and sweet. “Big game tonight.” 

Mitch does as he’s told.

*

Playing other monster teams is intense now that the league knows about Auston. They’re more aggressive, and while teams have always targeted him just for being good, it feels different now, more threatening.

Leafs fans follow them wherever they go, and he can draw on them a little, but he’s always strongest on home ice. That’s just how it works for everyone, but you notice it less in guys with lesser, really physical traits like Rask’s giant bear claws or Josi’s sabretooth fangs; they don’t seem that much scarier at home. Obviously, Sidney Crosby is pretty terrifying everywhere, but when you have to play him in his own barn… 

Auston might feel like he can push back with McDavid, but Crosby’s older and stronger and has been learning how to make the magic work for him for a decade longer. It’s hard to compete with that. And yet here he is in Pittsburgh, with the _original_ Next One breathing down his neck, and he’s got no idea what to do with his fledgeling magic that Crosby can’t already do faster and better and more instinctually.

Then again, there’s something neither Crosby nor McDavid has. Neither of them have Toronto.

One hundred years of fanaticism in the beating heart of hockey country, thirteen Cup wins, and a desperation that's festered for nearly fifty years _without_ a championship, that's a special kind of magic. There's hockey towns and then there's an original six team in the literal home of the Stanley Cup. There's wanting a win as much as everyone does, and then there's being so hungry for it you'll do anything. And that magic’s been building for years waiting for someone to take it on. Crosby had to build his from scratch in the shadow of Mario Lemieux. McDavid still has the Great One literally hanging over him.

 _Auston’s_ got Toronto. And Toronto is tired of losing. He doesn’t need to understand magic to understand that.

He rams the butt of his stick up, hard, and feels a savage spike of satisfaction at the resounding crack, and the way Crosby’s head snaps back. A splatter of what looks like glitter joins the couple of chiclets he spits onto the ice. It’s not until after he’s done it that Auston realises that might have been a really dumb move.

“You might regret that in a minute,” Crosby laughs, a smear of golden blood glittering on his shattered front teeth. “How do I look?”

There are a lot of bear man monsters in the NHL, but when Penguins fans say “don’t poke the Russian bear,” they fucking mean it. Auston barely has a moment to react before Malkin barrels into him out of nowhere. One moment he's staring at the mess he's made of Crosby’s mouth, the next he’s flying through the air, powerful arms wrapped around his shoulders while the world narrows into a snarl of hot breath and huge fangs snapping in his face, and the ice comes up to hit him like a truck.

For one blinding, breath-stealing minute Auston thinks it doesn't matter how much franchise saving magic he has on his side, Malkin is going to bite off his fucking face and then he'll be dead, just a bloody blue stain on Pittsburgh ice.

“Geno,” Crosby says mildly. He doesn’t even raise his voice. And Malkin lets go of Auston and glides away as if nothing ever happened.

Crosby smiles, and his teeth are already perfect again.

“Careful, eh?” he says.

Malkin high sticks Mitch in the mouth later in the game. He makes it look like an accident, but Auston knows it isn’t; it’s meant for him. _You come for me, I’ll come for them_. Mitch doesn’t lose any teeth, which is good because his won't grow back, but he does bleed, bright red and obscene on the blue-white ice. The Pittsburgh crowd bay for it like wolves.

Auston glares at Crosby across the benches while a trainer cleans Mitch up, and feels the magic of PPG Paints Arena pressing down on him like an oily cloud, like Crosby laying monstrous hands on him. It’s affecting all of them. He can see Mitch shaking. 

He takes off his glove so he can lay his palm on the back of Mitch’s neck, and feels him tremble for a moment longer and then relax. Auston doesn't say anything, but Mitch opens his mouth obediently and lets the trainer dab stinging brown antiseptic on his lip without flinching.

*

The touching thing works better on Mitch than anyone else, but he can do it with all his teammates, to some degree. One day he’ll probably be able to do it even without touching them. He hadn't realised the term “magic hands” was quite that literal, but it seems to go with his transformation; when Freddie's allowed a goal or two and he's getting stressed about it, Auston can clasp a hand around his wrist and calm him down within seconds. When someone’s injured Auston can't make it better but he can make him forget about the pain until the game ends.

Not everybody appreciates it.

“Keep your hands to yourself,” Naz snarls after taking three penalties in one period against the Sens. Two of them led to goals, and they’re already trailing badly; unless something miraculous is coming in the third they may as well go home now. He really needs to calm the fuck down.

Everyone’s frustrated and the room has this tense, jumpy atmosphere that makes Auston feel sick and uneasy. He seems far more susceptible to the feel of the room and the crowd now than he used to be, as if the anger and anxiety of the fans and his teammates is bouncing around inside him, rebounding and amplifying with every turnover and stupid penalty. It doesn’t matter how well _he_ plays. It’s like he’s a lightning rod for everyone’s feelings about the Leafs, good and bad.

“I’m trying to help,” he snaps, unable to help himself. Naz is just being a stubborn jackass. It’ll help _everyone_ if he just lets Auston calm him down, quick and easy. Auston reaches for him again, and Naz bats his hand away.

“Didn’t you hear me?” he snaps. “I don’t want it. That’s not how we do things here.”

Auston’s heard that so many times now that the phrase has started to lose all meaning. Obviously it _is_ how they do things here, because he’s been _doing_ it. There’s something special about the history and tradition of this team, for sure, but it’s stifling sometimes too, like being buried under a hundred years of expectations. There’s nothing _wrong_ with doing things differently.

“Hey,” Mitch says, popping up at Auston’s shoulder. “What’s…”

“Tell him I don’t want him messing with my head,” Naz says, his eyes still fixed on Auston, like he doesn’t want to look away. It strikes him that Naz doesn’t just look angry, he looks _scared_ , like he doesn’t know what Auston’s going to do.

“I can understand you myself,” he says, frowning. There’s no need for anyone to be scared of him. He’s still the same guy he’s always been, he’s just got these extra skills now, skills that can make them all better. He can feel Mitch’s hand on his back, unnaturally warm. Or maybe he’s just unnaturally cold.

“Then jot this down,” Naz tells him, and his lips move all exaggerated over bared teeth. “Don’t touch me again.”

*

They were sizing Mo up to be captain before Auston came along. Nobody ever says that out loud, but everyone knows it anyway. All the rookies seem to defer to him naturally, even though he’s not the oldest or the most experienced guy on the team. He's good and mature and stable and the perfect guy for the job. But none of that compares to a real, honest to goodness, bleeding-blue-and-white generational talent.

Mo doesn’t seem to hold it against Auston, to his credit, although that could be the magic as much as anything (Auston’s never sure any more what’s real, what’s friendship, and what’s just people deferring to the monster). Mo does take it upon himself to deliver some advice, though.

“It's not just about you, the monster thing,” he says. “Magic is a responsibility. You're the one with the power, but you're supposed to use it for all of them – all of us, I guess. D’you get what that means?”

Auston frowns. That's not just a monster thing, that's a hockey thing. Team is important, more important than any one player and his skills. You can't win a game on your own. Mo sighs.

“It means you can't let anyone get away with hurting you through your team,” Mo says patiently. “Sid doesn't get his hands dirty, sure, he almost never retaliates personally, but he's also the one who cops the abuse. He doesn't push anyone else into the line of fire. It's not like Marty picking a fight for you, he chooses that. But with the Penguins, you made Mitchy a target for them.”

Auston can remember that much. He remembers the blood on the ice, gold and then red, and how Mitch felt shaky with shock on the bench. “You mean don't start anything I can't finish myself.”

“Something like that, yeah,” Mo smiles. He pats Auston's knee in a fatherly sort of way. “You’re going to be something incredible, Matts. But you wouldn’t be anything without them. So it's on you to keep them safe.”

“You would have made a good captain,” Auston tells him.

*

After Mo says that, he takes to watching them sleep sometimes. His team.

He doesn't think too much about how he does it. He'll be at home and then he'll be somewhere else, standing at the end of Gards's bed listening to him snore into his wife’s long hair, or leaning over Brownie and watching the shadows of dreams flicker over his sleeping face. They don't notice, and it makes him feel better to know they're safe. He seems to need sleep less and less himself, these days, and the sleep he does manage is filled with strange, unsettling dreams.

He's been doing it almost every night for a month before Leo’s wife gets up to check on the baby and Leo rolls over and sees him standing there. His reaction surprises Auston, the way he swears and scrambles upright, kicking frantically in the sheets.

“What the fuck,” he gasps. His eyes are so wide there's a clear ring of white around each iris. “What are you doing?”

Auston shrugs. 

“My kid sleeps in this house, Matthews,” he says. “You can't just...” Then he looks around at the empty bed. “Where's Juulia?” He sounds genuinely alarmed, just on the edge of panic, and it takes Auston a moment to understand why.

“She's fine,” he says, frowning. “The baby’s fine. Juulia just went to check on him. I wouldn't hurt them.”

Leo pales. Then he sticks his chin out defiantly, as if he isn't sitting in his soft bed in pyjamas, with his wife and child a few thin walls away, as if a normal man with all those human vulnerabilities standing up to a monster could ever mean anything at all.

Auston doesn't know why he thought any of that.

He reaches for him, and Leo actually flinches away, like he doesn’t want Auston to touch him. But the moment Auston’s fingers brush his cheek he stills, eyelids drooping and face sagging drowsily.

“Shh, it's okay,” Auston tells him. “You’re all safe. I’ll never let anything happen to them, or you. Go back to sleep.”

His fingers trail over Leo’s forehead as he sinks back onto the bed, and then he leaves before Juulia can come back. But he doesn’t go back to the Komarov house after that.

It’s getting stronger, their compunction to follow him. He's never sent someone to sleep just by touching them before, without a word, and he wonders what else they'd do without even being told if he wanted them to. He’s not sure how to feel about it. He thinks maybe it should bother him more than it does.

Mo said he's supposed to keep them safe. Does that mean safe from him as well?

*

His fingernails are bluish, like a corpse under ice. He’s always cold now, so fucking cold. It _hurts_.

“Of course it hurts,” McDavid laughs, shaking his head, when Auston facetimes him to ask him about it, to show him the blue veins standing out under his translucent skin. They're not quite friends, but he's not as scary or as jealously guarded as Crosby, and he doesn't seem to be able to stop himself from talking about magic whenever Auston asks. Maybe he wants someone to talk to just as much. “You're burning away everything that made you human,” he explains. “Or freezing away, I guess. But it's worth it, Wayne says.” 

Wayne. Like that _thing_ up in the darkened box at Rogers Place is approachable enough to still have a name. Jesus.

“You've seen i—uh, him, then?” Auston says. “The Great One? Spoken to him?”

McDavid's face takes on a haunted look. “Well, no, not _seen_. But he's always with us, you know how it is. The team, the fans. We're...we're his, still. He came back, you know. He whispers to me sometimes.”

The very thought makes the hairs on the back of Auston's neck stand on end.

“Anyway, he says the pain's temporary,” McDavid shrugs. “Eventually it stops, or you stop noticing it so much, I'm not sure, and then you're just _better_. It's worth it.”

He seems certain. Auston's not though, not any more.

“Isn’t it kind of lonely?” he says. “Do you think...like, monsters don’t have families. Don’t have loved ones.”

“You can’t think of it that way,” McDavid says, shaking his head. “Attachments like that are weaknesses. You’ve got your team, and your city, and that’s enough.”

“So what, you’ve never wanted…”

McDavid frowns at him, hard, then looks away.

“I had...someone, once. He’s gone now.” He laughs, short and sharp, even though nothing about any of this seems funny at all. “Couldn’t stand the heat, I guess.”

Auston doesn’t ask.

*

“Hey,” Mitch tugs on his sleeve at the end of practice. “You okay?”

Auston's smile feels wrong on his face these days, but he turns it on anyway, for Mitch. “Yeah, fine,” he says, shrugging. He tries not to think about a dark private box at the top of an arena, of hunkering down alone and apart like a nightmare made flesh, watching his friends play and retire and go home with their families. He tries not to think about never touching anyone again without turning them into his puppet, or about whispering arcane secrets to some promising kid who's never even seen his face, just to have someone to talk to.

“Your dad went home, right?” Mitch says. Auston nods. His dad hadn't really given much of an explanation for why he couldn't stay in Toronto for longer, like they originally planned. He just looked kind of pale and urgent, and said he had to get home. When his mom called the next day to let him know dad got home safe, she sounded like she'd been crying.

“And you're doing alright on your own? Eating okay?”

Auston nods again. He's been eating weird stuff – raw steaks straight out of the package from the supermarket, all bloody and dripping, handfuls of ice cubes – but he figures that's normal enough for a monster. Mitch looks unconvinced.

“You've been avoiding me,” he says, chewing his lip.

“I haven't,” Auston says. “I've just been...preoccupied. Monster stuff, you know,”

It's a lie, because Auston doesn’t know if he can touch Mitch anymore without bespelling him or something, and he just wants to touch Mitch all the time, can’t imagine being near him without wanting it. There’s something so warm and alive about him, like a human ray of sunshine, and Auston’s so fucking cold and so fucking lonely. It’s a lie, but Mitch believes him, because he doesn't have a dishonest bone in his body. He rolls his eyes and elbows Auston in the side.

“You were more fun before all the monster stuff,” he says, poking his tongue between his teeth. “Come over and play CoD with me. I like doing stuff you're terrible at.”

“I shouldn't,” Auston says. It's not what he meant to say at all, but he was watching Mitch's mouth and thinking about what Mo said, about not putting him in harm's way. And about what McDavid said, not that horseshit about attachments being a weakness, but the other part, about having someone who’s “gone now.” 

Mitch makes a face at him. “Why not? You got something more important to do?”

Auston hesitates, but he can't think of anything. He's not trying very hard, to be honest. Just because he shouldn't doesn't mean he doesn't want to.

“I guess not,” he admits.

*

Mitch is probably the only person who still treats him like a person, the same as before his blood started to change, and that’s another thing that’s hard to let go of.

It’s not the same hanging out anymore. Auston doesn’t seem to have room left in his head for much besides hockey and magic, and all the stuff they’d normally talk about just seems flat and distant to him now. He can probably play video games better than he used to, better reflexes, but he can’t bring himself to care about them. But it’s still good. Mitch doesn’t seem to mind when Auston zones out on the couch, lost in the electric buzzing inside his own head. Auston tries not to touch him too much, but Mitch touches him all the time, and Auston figures that’s okay. It’s like Mitch can tell he needs it. Or maybe they both need it.

He can’t stop thinking about McDavid’s guy who “couldn’t stand the heat”. He wants to know what it means, even though he doesn’t want to ask. Did the guy turn on him, the way the Leafs keep turning on Auston? Or was the magic too much for someone to get that close, too dangerous, so that McDavid hurt him himself?

He doesn’t want to hurt Mitch. He’s scared of hurting him, maybe the only thing he still feels scared of. But he can’t quite leave him alone either.

That’s probably why he finds himself appearing in Mitch’s apartment in the middle of the night, to watch him sleep. Surely he can’t hurt him just by watching. Only when he gets there Mitch isn’t asleep. He’s sitting up in bed, eyes wide and shiny in the dark. He gives a little jump when he sees Auston, but otherwise doesn’t seem all that surprised that he’s there.

“Leo said you...you visited him,” he says. “He told Naz and Naz told me. That maybe you were coming to all of us, watching us sleep. Naz told me I should lock my door, but that wouldn't have stopped you, would it?”

Auston doesn't bother to answer. He's so cold, and he can feel Mitch's body heat radiating off him from across the room.

“I waited up,” Mitch says, his voice small but unwavering. “A lot of times. To see if...and you never came.”

Auston's by the side of the bed without even thinking about it. He's not sure if he moved like a normal person moves, or if it was the same sort of magic that got him here in the first place. He's starting to lose track of the edges of things, of precisely where reality ends and what is and isn't allowed.

Mitch looks up at him, all white skin and big, blue-grey eyes, completely open and trusting and very, very human. Stronger than people give him credit for, but still breakable. Auston knows he shouldn't, he does still know that. But he's just so fucking cold.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he says, and his voice has all these weird undertones to it that sound like breaking glass.

“So don’t,” says Mitch, and kisses him.

It feels like sinking into a warm bath. Mitch's lips part so easily, and Auston can't tell if he's making this happen or just letting it happen, doesn't know how to tell, wishes he cared enough to stop and find out. But Mitch doesn't go soft and pliant at his touch, like he's following some unspoken command. He tugs at Auston, pulling him down, and Auston goes. It's easier than falling asleep.

“You're shaking,” he says, later. He’s concerned, but his voice comes out flat. At least there are no strange extra noises, though. Just his voice, cool and inflectionless. The shaking isn’t with fear or emotion, he thinks, but with cold; he can hear Mitch's teeth chattering, even though Auston feels warm for the first time he can remember.

“S-sorry,” Mitch says, tucking his face into the curve of Auston's neck. When Auston reaches to touch his cheek, to soothe him into magical sleep, Mitch bats his hand away. “Don't,” he says. “You said you didn’t want to, remember? I'm alright.”

The tip of his nose is like a tiny icicle right under Auston's ear, but he can't bring himself to mind.

He thinks maybe he can say it here, what's been building inside him for weeks. It feels like something clawing at his throat, the confession that both wants and wants not to be said. But here in the dark bedroom with Mitch curled around him, breath coming out in little cold white huffs of cloud, he feels safer than anywhere.

“I don't think I want to,” he says softly. “Change. Be one of them.” Saying it out loud still feels awful, terrifying, like the fanged mouth of Wayne Gretzky might lunge down from the ceiling and rip him in two.

Mitch exhales slowly, leaning back enough to look up at him under dark lashes. His hair’s standing on end from Auston raking his fingers through it, a splotchy flush still just fading on his face and throat, and Auston knows for sure that he doesn't want to change any more if it means not being human enough for this.

“Okay,” Mitch tells him, reaching up and stroking light fingers over his cheek. They feel very cold. “That's cool. You don't have to.”

Auston's breath hitches. “I don't know how to stop,” he admits.

Mitch looks serious. He reaches up and gently pulls Auston’s head down so he can kiss him, soft but sure. He’s still cold, but now Auston's the one shaking.

“We'll work it out,” Mitch says.

*

“Are you alright?” he hears Marty’s voice a few feet away. It’s soft and solicitous so Auston knows he’s not talking to him - nobody but Mitch talks to him much anymore - but something about his tone makes Auston turn and look anyway. He’s bending over Mitch’s stall, worry pinching his face. “You look pale. You’re not sick, are you?”

Mitch does look pale, the circles under his eyes as dark as bruises, but he flashes the same warm smile as always.

“I’m fine, dad,” he says, poking Marty in the shin with his foot. “Stop worrying.”

Marty presses the back of his hand against Mitch’s forehead anyway, like he really is his dad, checking for a fever.

“Jesus, you’re _freezing_. What have you--” Auston looks away sharply as Marty’s head whips around to stare at him. Not quick enough though. Within seconds Marty’s right up in his face, angrier than Auston’s ever seen him off the ice. “What did you do to him?”

“ _Nothing_ ,” Mitch says, jumping up after him. “For fuck’s sake, Marty, leave him alone.”

Auston stays perfectly still, magic buzzing through his veins like lightning. He could really hurt Marty right now. It’d be easy. When things belong to you, you can break them if you want. He feels sick.

“He’s your fucking teammate, stop it,” Mitch says, yanking on Marty’s arm, but he doesn’t budge. The rest of the locker room’s gone silent, staring at them.

“I don’t know _what_ you are now,” Marty says in a low voice, and it’s right in Auston’s ear but the room’s quiet enough that everyone must hear it, “but the real Matty wouldn’t make his friend look like that. He wouldn’t be able to bear it.”

Auston bolts out of the room, not because he’s afraid of Marty hitting him, because he’s pretty sure even furiously angry Marty wouldn’t do that, but because he’s right. Auston doesn’t know what he is either. And he’s afraid of what the thing he is might do.

He stumbles blindly into a bathroom and staggers into the sink, holds on to the enamel so hard his fingers hurt. When he looks at his own face in the mirror it’s like looking at a stranger, ice-pale and bluish, his jaw as sharp as a knife, eyes black and fathomless. He feels like screaming but his face looks completely blank, dead-eyed.

He turns around and sinks to the floor, puts his face in his hands. It takes less than a minute for the door to open again. Auston doesn’t have to look up to know who the soft footsteps belong to, or the warm hand on his shoulder, but he does anyway. Mitch does a double take as soon as he does.

“Matts,” he says softly, squeezing his shoulder. “Auston, you’re crying.”

He doesn’t sound sad about it. He sounds wondering, excited even. He reaches out and touches Auston’s wet cheek.

“Of course I’m fucking crying,” Auston says, and his voice cracks a little, with a creaky sound like ice about to go out from under you. “Everyone hates me.”

“No,” Mitch says, and a delighted smile spreads slowly across his face. “Don’t you get it? It’s _working_.”

Auston stares at him, at his face all thin and white except his cold flushed cheeks, and the dark shadows around his eyes. He can’t believe he didn’t notice any of that before now.

“It’s killing you, you mean,” he says. He shakes his head vigorously. “We have to stop. You can’t keep doing this.”

Mitch grabs his wrist. “No, hey. I mean, we can stop, but I’m not just giving up on you. We can...maybe we can share it around. Get the rest of the team involved.”

Auston blinks at him. “You want me to fuck an entire hockey team?”

Mitch stares blankly, his mouth dropping open. He looks completely ridiculous. Then he he lets out a loud, startled bark of laughter.

“That was a joke. Oh my god, you’re _joking_.” He gives Auston’s shoulder a little shake. “Do you know how long it’s been since I heard you make a joke? I _knew_ you were still in there!”

Mitch flings his arms around him and hugs him so violently Auston thinks he might choke.

“You’re back, oh my god, you’re back. I missed you so much, fuck.”

When Auston hugs him back he can feel the ridges of his spine through his shirt and a fresh surge of guilt washes over him. It’s been weeks, weeks of Mitch just letting Auston steal his warmth and not saying anything, even though it’s obviously making him sick. So much for not hurting him.

“Okay,” Mitch says, carefully, pulling back a little. “Do you...are you still, like, into me or was that just a monster thing? Because I mean, I understand if it was a monster thing, but—”

“Definitely a monster thing,” Auston says, smiling, and kisses him. Just a quick one, now he knows what it takes out of Mitch to be close to him, but he just has to.

“Okay,” Mitch says, relaxing a little. “Okay that’s good. That’s really good.”

“It is,” Auston agrees. Probably the best thing in the world right now. “Listen, can I...can I try something?”

It’s kind of novel, asking before doing magic things, but his head’s clear enough for the first time to remember that’s important. Not hurting people is more than just not injuring them. Mitch nods, and Auston lays one hand against his cheek. Mitch closes his eyes.

Calming his teammates down isn’t just a matter of touching them. He does something magical too, something so instinctual he’s never really paid attention to how he does it, it’s just like breathing in.

This time he concentrates, and instead of drawing something in he gives a little push.

Mitch gasps and his eyes fly open, luminous and shimmering with magic. There’s an impression of Auston’s hand on his cheek in silvery frost that lingers after Auston lets go.

“Wow,” he says, and his breath comes out in a frigid plume, glittering with ice crystals. “Did you know you could do that?”

Auston flexes his fingers, looking down at his hands. They feel warm, almost like normal human hands. It doesn’t feel like it will last, but it’s a relief too; he hadn’t noticed how deafening the icy roar of magic sizzling through his blood had become until he feels the respite of silence.

“No,” he admits. “Can I do it again?” Maybe he can do more, make it last longer. His fingertips already feel cold again.

Mitch laughs, the glow of magic in his eyes beginning to fade. “Are you kidding?” he says. “That was awesome.”

The best thing is that he _looks_ better too, healthier. There’s more colour in his face, he doesn’t look as tired and wrung out.

It occurs to Auston that he’s never really thought about why the magic in Pittsburgh is so much more spread around than it is in Edmonton, or here. Why the Penguins are so much more successful as a team than the Oilers or the Leafs, even though all of them have a monster figurehead. He’d just assumed it was more experience, Crosby knowing more about magic than he does or McDavid does. But that doesn’t make _sense_. McDavid’s got the actual Great One whispering secrets in his ear.

What if Crosby just knows something Gretzky doesn’t _want_ McDavid to know.

He cups Mitch’s face in both hands, and when they kiss he does the magic push thing again. Now he’s paying more attention it’s not even really pushing, it feels more like opening a dam and just letting the magic pour out of him, like it _wants_ to go.

The relief is instant, he feels more human than he’s felt in months, and the way Mitch shudders and clutches at his wrists, leans eagerly into the kiss, makes him feel even more human. Mitch laughs, exhilarated and breathless.

“Holy shit,” he says. “You’ve got to share that around. I mean, not the kissing bit, but the rest of it? That’s incredible.”

“Right now?” Auston says, and his voice sounds more normal than it has in months. Well. Maybe a little lower than normal. He drags his thumb over Mitch’s lip.

Mitch grins. “Or tomorrow. No rush.”

*

Before their next game, Auston waits by the car while Mitch goes to get Willy and Zach. It seems weird lurking around out here, but Mitch seems to think it’s better than trying to explain to everyone at once. Willy and Zach are his lineys, his _friends_ , or they were his friends before he got too creepy for anyone but Mitch to cope with. If anyone’s going to listen to him, it’s them.

Auston’s nervous anyway. He tries to tell himself it’s a good sign that he’s even still capable of feeling nervous.

“This feels like we’re going to a drug deal,” Willy’s saying as they get closer, his voice echoing off the concrete.

“As if you’ve ever been to a drug deal in your life,” Zach grins. But the grin falls right off his face when he sees Auston leaning against the car. Auston raises one hand in a little wave.

Zach and Willy exchange a look.

“Don’t freak out,” Mitch says, “but we need your help.”

“We,” Zach repeats warily, without looking away from Auston. “He means _you_ need help, right? For what?”

“Yeah,” Auston agrees. Zach’s too smart to fall for any bullshit, so he just gets straight to it. “To keep me, you know. Human. But it’s not just that. I can, uh. I can help you too.”

“That sounds fucking shifty,” Willy says, too loud, and his laugh rings in the deserted space. “This is totally a magic drug deal. What do we have to do, sell you our souls?”

“Shut up, Will,” Zach says. “So? We’re going to need more than that.”

“I know that, I’m--”

“Because you’ve been scaring the shit out of everyone for months. It’s really hard to know if we can trust you.”

“You can trust _me_ ,” Mitch says. Zach turns and frowns at him.

“No offence, Mitchy, but no, I can’t,” he says. “We know he can mess with people’s minds now. How can I be sure he’s not manipulating you right now?”

“You can’t,” Auston says. “I’m not, but I know there’s no reason you should believe that. So just. I’m sorry. I haven’t...I haven’t been myself for a while.”

“But you are now?” Willy looks more vulnerable than Zach, somehow, chewing his lip. Both more hopeful and more anxious.

“Yeah,” Auston nods. “Kind of. Better, anyway.”

“Sorta hard to tell with you, man,” Willy says. His grin looks a little weak, lopsided, but it gets more certain when Auston laughs.

“How?” says Zach.

Auston takes a deep breath and rakes a hand through his hair. “I’m not an expert,” he says, “but it felt like...I had too much magic just kind of, building up? And touching people sort of releases a bit of it, takes the pressure off, but not enough. More touching is better.” Zach flicks a swift, shrewd look in Mitch’s direction, but doesn’t say anything. “But it turns out I can share magic with people on purpose, and that’s much better. It makes me more normal, and I don’t…” he looks down guiltily. “I don’t take anything from the other person. It makes them better too.”

“We think maybe that’s how the Penguins do things,” Mitch says. “Spread the magic around the whole team. Like, obviously Sid’s the focal point or whatever, but it works for all of them too.”

“Yeah,” Auston nods. “I want to try it with the whole team. But it made sense to ask you guys first.”

There’s a long silence, and Auston stares at the ground. There’s a patch of oil right near Willy’s shoe and he stares at the shifting colours while he waits for somebody to say something. The tips of his fingers are starting to sting with pins and needles, getting too cold again.

“Okay,” Willy says at last. “I’m game.”

Auston looks up. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” Willy nods firmly. He holds out his hand, determined, and then his face creases into a smile. “I always wanted to do a magic drug deal, anyway.”

*

Later, after the game, after the three of them have played so seamlessly together they seemed like one creature with three bodies, Auston explains it to the rest of the team, with Willy and Zach and Mitch’s help. Some of them take a while to come round, but the guys who’ve played in other NHL teams before warm up pretty quickly to the idea of having magic again, and then the others sort of go along with them. Patty’s totally unphased, but of course he is. He’s been playing monster hockey as long as Auston’s been alive. He just shrugs and says he was kind of getting used to having normal human teeth again.

“I don’t think you’ll get shark teeth this time,” Mitch tells him seriously. Patty just laughs.

Hainsey wonders why Auston never asked him about the situation in Pittsburgh.

“Yeah, I wasn’t there too long, but I could’ve told you,” he shrugs. “Sid does that magic thing before every game. Keeps him grounded and makes the team better. Helps everyone’s vision too, having a bit of him with you out there.”

“And you didn’t think of mentioning this earlier?” Mo says. Hainsey shrugs.

“I don’t know, no one ever talks about magic in this place. It’s all “that’s not how we do things around here.” I figured the kid knew what he was doing.”

Auston laughs. It feels weird and creaky still, as if his voice has forgotten how to do it, but it feels good too, like shaking the cobwebs off.

“Dude,” he says. “I’m not sure I ever know what I’m doing.”

*

Auston’s never going to be ordinary.

Elite sports changes people, that’s just a fact, and there’s no turning back from it now. He still bleeds blue and white, still gets cold and distant sometimes. It’s still too easy to make people do what he wants them to do, and he has to remind himself not to do that off the ice, sometimes.

He can still feel the beating heart of Toronto throbbing through everything, the feverish intensity of love and worship ratcheting higher and higher as the season goes on. There are still more number 34 jerseys in the home crowd than any other number, but now he can spread the magic around a bit, and the more he shares the love the more the fans do too. He was out downtown with Mitch and Marty just recently and a little kid came up to them and shyly asked for Marty’s autograph, looked right past Auston like he wasn’t there. It was kind of awesome.

People say things, of course. They say he didn’t have the guts to go all in, that he’s weaker now he’s less monstrous, less intimidating on the ice. Sometimes weirder things like how Americans don’t understand magic, like the magic of the city must have rejected him because he comes from a nontraditional hockey background. It’s all shit. Auston doesn’t care. 

He only needs to look to Edmonton to know he’s doing the right thing, where McDavid just seems to be going from strength to strength but the Oilers are tanking, right at the bottom of the league. McDavid’s getting more unstable, too, more distant, more aggressive with reporters. Auston thinks he looks lonely. He should probably reach out to him soon and tell him maybe the Great One doesn’t really have his best interests at heart, maybe just wants to relive his own glory days, salve his own loneliness.

McDavid needs to know being a monster is better with company, anyway. Sure Toronto’s got more magic than the city knows what to do with. Sure it’s all drawn to Auston like moths to a flame, and he doesn’t have to share it if he doesn’t want to. Sure he could be a monstrous horror like the Great One in no time if he left his team and his humanity behind.

But that’s just not how they do things here.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [A Hoard of Gold(en Knights)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14611719) by [Julorean](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Julorean/pseuds/Julorean)




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